Cyrus Vance

CYRUS VANCE, the former US Secretary of State who has died aged 84, resigned from Jimmy Carter's administration in 1980 over the bungled attempt to rescue 52 Americans held hostage in Teheran.

A man whose cautious style of diplomacy contrasted vividly with that of his predecessor Henry Kissinger, Vance had advised strongly against a military operation, but had been unable to persuade President Carter - or the head of the National Security Council, Zbigniew Brzezinski - to abandon the idea.

In consequence, the operation had been launched in April 1980 - five months after armed Iranian "students" had invaded the American embassy in Teheran and seized the hostages - and then humiliatingly aborted, with the loss of eight American servicemen, a fleet of helicopters and a transport aircraft.

The collapse of the mission effectively sealed Mr Carter's electoral fate, opening the way for Ronald Reagan's easy presidential victory later in the year, with Carter holding only six of the 50 States.

Vance had seen the implications of the rescue plan only too clearly. He had told the President that if the American troops reached their Teheran embassy, some of the hostages would probably be killed; and that even if the mission were successful, further hostages would almost certainly be taken.

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And these were not his only fears. "The bloodshed and the consequent death and injury to Iranians," he warned the President, "could well lead to a wider explosion across the Persian Gulf - which might divide the Islamic world from the West, pitting Islamic peoples on the one hand and the West on the other."

A week after the raid had failed, Vance went to the White House to deliver his letter of resignation, which he had written as he observed the strengthening of the President's resolve to authorise the operation.

But by then, at least, Vance could reflect with satisfaction on several significant foreign policy achievements during his time in office. Relations with China had improved; progress had been made in agreements to reduce strategic nuclear arms; and the Camp David accord between Egypt and Israel in 1978 had led to the signing of a peace treaty between the two countries.

After his resignation, he largely retired from the public eye until in 1991 the United Nations appointed him as their special envoy to war-torn Yugoslavia.

In Croatia, he helped to achieve a ceasefire between Serbs and Croats, paving the way for the arrival of 15,000 peacekeepers in the newly independent republic; but he failed to end the fighting in Bosnia and resigned in 1993. It was, he said, probably the most difficult task he had ever faced.

Cyrus Roberts Vance was born on March 27 1917, at Clarksburg, West Virginia, where his father was a successful insurance executive and his mother an enthusiastic force in civic affairs. Cyrus was three when his father died of pneumonia, and he was brought up by his idealistic mother.

He was educated at Kent School, Connecticut, where he excelled in sport, rowing with a crew that competed in the Henley Regatta. He went on to read Economics at Yale University - where his gangly appearance earned him the nickname "Spider" - and then to Yale Law School.

After the Second World War - during which he served in destroyers as a gunnery officer in the Far East - he worked briefly as assistant to the president of the Mead Corporation, manufacturers of paper products, before joining the Wall Street law firm of Simpson, Thacher and Bartlett.

Specialising in civil litigation, Vance became a partner of the firm in 1956, and in 1959-60 acted as an associate counsel for Senate sub-committees in investigating the strengths of the American and Soviet nuclear forces, space satellite programmes, and Defense Department budgeting processes.

When President Kennedy was elected in January 1961, he was advised by his Vice-President, Lyndon Johnson, to appoint Vance as general counsel (chief legal officer) for the Defense Department. Vance duly accepted the appointment, and entered full-time government service for the first time.

It was the first step in a rapid political ascent. Vance established a close relationship with Defense Secretary Robert McNamara, and after 18 months McNamara recommended Vance's promotion to Secretary of the Army, a role in which Vance made the Army more mobile and cost-effective.

Under President Johnson, in 1964, Vance became Deputy Secretary of Defense and set out on a number of trouble-shooting missions.

He visited Panama, the Dominican Republic and, in 1966, South Vietnam, to assess Saigon's ability to sustain the rising tempo of war against the Communist forces.

At that time, Vance championed the Americans' role in the Vietnam conflict, advising that more troops and weapons should be sent to South Vietnam. He also favoured intensifying the bombing of the North, and swift air counter-attacks when American bases and installations were bombarded.

But Vance's political career was now interrupted by a painful spinal condition, and in 1967 he returned to his Wall Street law firm. Later that year, however, when race riots broke out in Detroit, he accepted Mr Johnson's request to accompany a special delegation to Detroit to review the situation.

This resulted in parts of the city being declared disaster areas. Black leaders hailed Vance's diplomacy in handling a volatile crisis. His subsequent report on the matter was accepted as a blueprint for dealing with urban disturbances with the minimum of bloodshed.

Also in 1967, Vance acted as Johnson's special envoy to Cyprus, where he helped to defuse a situation which threatened to lead to war between Greece and Turkey. In 1968 he was sent to South Korea, after North Korea had broken cease-fire agreements and had seized an American warship, the Pueblo.

When, soon afterwards, the assassination of Martin Luther King led to race riots in Washington, Vance, with US Attorney-General Ramsay Clark, helped to formulate a peace-keeping plan hailed for its "humanitarian restraint".

By now Vance had joined the critics of the American role in Vietnam, just as the first moves were being made towards arranging peace talks. In May 1968, the talks opened in Paris, with Vance appearing as deputy chief delegate under Johnson's roving ambassador, Averell Harriman.

These talks established the momentum that eventually led to the cease-fire of 1973, and finally to America's withdrawal from Vietnam.

Before Mr Johnson left the White House to make way for Richard Nixon, he awarded Vance America's highest civilian honour, the Medal of Freedom. Subsequently, when Jimmy Carter was elected President in 1976, he chose Cy Vance as his Secretary of State.

Vance was awarded the Legion d'honneur by France, and in 1994 he was appointed honorary KBE.